“Want some breakfast?”
“I could eat something.”
“Great. Freddy’s over at McDonald’s getting a bagful. He’ll be back in a bit.”
Ford fell into a chair and stretched out full-length.
“So how’s it going?”
“Freeman’s a busy fellow. Making money like he owned the mint.”
Hooper got a cassette recorder from his leather valise and plugged it into the socket under the desk. He dictated his name and the date and Ford’s name, then played it back to make sure it was working.
Harrison Ronald watched this operation with heavy eyelids.
“You’re tired.”
“Amen.”
“Coffee will perk you up. You want to start now?”
“Okay.”
It had been a week since Ford had talked to Hooper. So Ford covered the past week minute by minute — names, descriptions, addresses, drug quantities, estimated amounts of money, everything Ford could recall. He had taken no notes, written nothing down: that would have been too dangerous. Still, after eight months, he knew exactly what Hooper and the Justice Department wanted, so it flowed forth without prompting.
Freddy, Hooper’s assistant, came in ten minutes after they started. Ford kept on talking as the men shared coffee and breakfast biscuits stuffed with eggs, cheese, and sausage.
Ford talked for almost an hour. When he finished Hooper had questions, lots of them. That went on for another hour with only two short pauses to change cassettes. When they were through Hooper knew what Ford had observed this past week almost as well as Ford did.
Finally Hooper said, “So what do you think?”
Harrison Ronald held out his coffee cup for a refill, which Freddy provided from a thermos. “I think there’s too much crack in the city. They can’t move the stuff fast enough. And I think Freeman is getting, or is about to get, a lot of pressure from the Costello mob to wash his money with them, probably at a higher cost. Somebody removed Walter Harrington and Second Potomac from the game. Freeman and his fellow dealers got some problems.”
“What do you think Freeman’ll do?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t been able to get a hint. I do know this: the guy is sharp as a razor. He didn’t get where he is by letting people cut themselves in on his action, by taking less and liking it. I think Freeman might fight back. He’s definitely the man for it.”
Freddy disagreed. He was in his late forties, also white, and had chased dopers since he joined the FBI. “I think Freeman and the others will cut back on the amount of coke they’re bringing in. They have to do that or expand the market by fighting each other. They all have a real good thing here and they’ve made a lot of money. A lot of money. They won’t be able to retire and live the good life if they get into heavy ordnance.”
“There’s no love lost between the big hitters,” Harrison Ronald objected.
“Business is business and money is money,” Freddy said.
“What do you guys want me to do if the shooting starts?”
“Run like hell,” Hooper muttered.
“For Christ’s sake, don’t kill any civilians,” Freddy added.
“Cut and run?”
“Yep,” said Hooper. “You’re no good to anybody if you’re dead.”
“Do you guys have enough?”
“We got enough to lock up Freeman for thirty years, and most of the people he works for.”
“And the cops and politicians on the take?”
Hooper turned off the recorder and removed the cassette. He marked it with a pen from his shirt pocket.
“And the cops and politicians?” Ford prompted.
“You got a lot. More than we hoped for. But if someone puts you in the cemetery we got nothing. Oh, we know a ton, but we won’t have a witness to get it into evidence.”
“I don’t think I’ll get into the inner circle anytime soon. Freeman’s got four lieutenants, and two of them are his brothers. They’re all millionaires many times over and each of them would go to the grave for Freeman McNally.”
“Maybe that can be arranged,” Freddy said.
“What d’ya mean by that?”
“Nothing to worry about. Gimme some particulars on each one.” Freddy pulled out a pencil and a pocket notebook.
“Now wait just a fucking minute! We’re cops. I’m not going to ice any of these guys, except in self-defense.”
“We’re not asking you to kill anybody and we’re sure as hell not going to. Jesus! This isn’t Argentina! But maybe we can get one of these guys off the street for a while and leave a vacancy at the trough for you.”
The undercover officer talked for ten minutes. He told them everything he knew; the names of the wives, the mistresses, the kids, what they ate, what they laughed at, how they liked their liquor, and how often they used their own products.
In the silence that followed his recitation, Hooper asked, “How’s that car running?”
“Real sweet.” Ford smiled faintly. “You gotta go for a ride sometime. It’s the hottest thing I ever sat in.”
“Stay alive, Harrison. Please.”
“I’ll do my best.” Harrison Ronald’s smile broadened into a grin. “That’s a promise.”
“You can quit anytime, you know.”
“Yeah.”
“I mean it. We’ve got a lot more than we ever thought we’d get. If you want to go back to Evansville, just say so and you’ll be on your way today.”
“I’ll stick a while longer. I confess, I’m curious about Tony Anselmo and how he fits in.”
“Curiosity has killed a lot of cops.”
“I know that.”
On the way back to Washington the thought occurred to him, not for the first time, that he should have stayed in the Marines. At the age of twenty, after two years of college, he had joined the Corps. He had done a four-year hitch, the last two on Okinawa where he had been an instructor in unarmed combat. He had grown to love the Corps. But his girl was in Indiana and she wouldn’t leave. So he took his discharge and went home and took the test for the police while he was trying to talk her into marrying him.
He got accepted by the police the afternoon before she ditched him. The oldest story in the world. She had dated other men while he was gone. He was a great guy but she wasn’t in love. She hoped they’d always be friends.
He had learned a lot in the Corps, things that would keep him alive now, like managing stress and self-confidence. And unarmed combat. As a rule street gangs didn’t contain experts at fighting with their hands. Oh, occasionally you ran into a karate guy who thought he was pretty tough. But while he was getting ready to give you one of those lethal kicks, you went for him in an aggressive, brutally violent way and broke his leg, then crushed his windpipe. And these Uzi toters never practiced with their weapons. Murder was their game, not combat.
He thought about murder for a while. His murder.
When this was over, he might go back to the Corps. Why not?
CHAPTER TEN
Jake Grafton had no more than walked through the door Wednesday evening when the telephone rang. Callie answered it. After exchanging pleasant greetings with whomever was on the other end, she offered the instrument to Jake. “It’s for you.”
“Hello.”
“Captain Grafton, this is Jack Yocke, Washington Post.”
“Hi.”
“Sorry to bother you at home, but we just got a story from a stringer in South America that perhaps you can help me with. It seems that the U.S. Army sent some people to Colombia and they shot it out with Chano Aldana’s bodyguards and arrested him. Apparently there were some Colombian police along, but the word we get is that it was a U.S. Army operation all the way.”
“Why do you think I can help you with that story?” Callie was standing there watching him, futilely trying to push her hair back off her forehead. She must really like this jerk, though Jake hadn’t the foggiest idea why.